Posts tagged ‘lisa simpson wedding planner ‘

I was at the Island Hotel when this bride and groom and her parents were walking around looking at it as a potential for her wedding reception, and they liked what they saw me doing for that wedding and I got booked for Maria’s. Their ceremony was at a church that does not have church ladies and I have done a few there now, so I was over there getting everyone up the aisle too.

From our awesome placecard table floral to the church and the ballroom, EBD Floral did a beautiful job again as always.

Linens and napkins came from Luxe. We even had caricature artists after dinner which were very popular.

Chivaris/dancefloor/lighting/draping by my pals at TMMPRO

Thanks to Jacqueline Kay for some of the photos above and some are mine, the bad ones, lol. And as always, to the Island Hotel team, thank you for being awesome.

What a joy/pleasure May was to work with on planning her wedding. I am so lucky I really do have lovely brides, grooms, couples.

The Pavilion ballroom at the Ritz-Carlton Laguna offers such a beautiful backdrop during cocktails and later throughout the evening. These 2 pics I took were at sunset time, another beautiful S CA sunset.

4snapz photobooth knew she liked Disney and brought them these ears to wear/keep, that was so lovely. My vendors really do put 300% into what they do as well as love. My 2nd red dancefloor in 2 months, looked awesome when May had her red dress on. Did you also notice the red rose petals in the ice luge??

We pulled together a really lovely vendor team for this lovely couple – Alvarron Ent/dj-Al, Tony Florez photog (some of his and some of mine above), The Emotion Picture Studio/video-Marc, Joyce Luck for making the girls look lovely, Carving Ice for the luge, TMMPRO for the red dancefoor/chiavaris/lighting, Flowers Etc/Debby for being so easy/nice to work with and Lake Forest Limos for getting everyone to the church and back from the church, and of course to our family at the Ritz-Carlton Laguna. xoxoxo

There was a special backstory to this wedding, they booked short term (which has turned into a thing this year, with my short term couples booking a hotel from 5 days prior to 4 weeks prior and off we go, I have always had 6-8 week out couples and longer of course, but this is the year of very short term, and I love the challenge, and as fate has it, my couples are ending up with awesome vendors who were also available, so I call that fate and we were waiting for you but you didn’t know it) and between the hotel, me and then the vendors who came on board we all went over and above, and Brenda was such a sweet bride we wanted her to have the wedding of her dreams and she did!

It was a morning ceremony and lunch reception with no dancing, so we did a different setup in the beautiful Pavilion ballroom with the sweetheart table at the end of the room

Thanks to the awesome vendor team on this one, Frank Salas/Photographer, Flowers by Cina, Design Visage, Peter/Vive Ent for all the music, and Michelle at the Ritz-Carlton Laguna for making it work for this lovely couple and wonderful mother of the groom.

It really was all our pleasure to make Brenda’s dream come true, her tears only reinforced why we do what we do.

We have done Indian wedding celebrations all over S Ca, but this was our first at Laguna Cliffs. You will notice that our lovely bride strayed from the traditional colors used for the wedding (my brides tend to stray).

They actually booked Teri for the day as I was already booked, but I managed to make it for the Indian am ceremony before I headed off to my wedding, and Teri and the team carried on with the luncheon, the pm ceremony/cocktails/dinner/dance.

Thanks to Lin & Jirsa for the pics, they turned out wayyyyyy better than any of the ones we took on our phones, lol!!

Thanks to the team at Laguna Cliffs, as always we love working with you

Working with Erika and David over the past year was just a joy. Very busy couple with kids going here and there and travelling and busy with work, so sometimes wedding planning halted and then we would get going again. That is the beauty of how I work, I could pull your wedding together in a week, but for most brides that would freak them out, so anytime longer than that means you can halt anytime you want/need to and there is no panic/pressure from me!!!

Erika had inspiration pics that she pretty much stuck to through the process and they were very much a reflection of her, soft, lovely and in love with love

All the tables had these lovely floorlength linen overlays and we did not use the Ritz baseplates (2 to choose from) this year my brides are loving these new chargers I get through one of my vendors.

The furniture setting on the balcony was actually copied from a wedding they had gone to, but we added florals to the wrought iron and Erika provided the rug which means when she sees it at home it will remind her of her wedding, love that

In 16 years of doing weddings in the Plaza Room no one ever brought up the idea of draping the whole room, but over the years I had brides who wanted to cover paintings in there so we had been creative with draping particular areas, placing trees and placing something on the mantle to cover the fireplace picture, but draping the whole room, hmmmmm. So when Erika said lets do it, I was excited to see the outcome, and it was

l

beautiful, and now all my brides are doing it. It totally transforms the room and makes it soft and romantic and elegant, intimate and I think it makes the room feel a bit bigger.

We had an awesome candy table setup in the foyer during dinner and guests made to go bags or grabbed some to eat later in the evening when they felt the need.

I love it when a bride lets me guide them to the perfect team for them for their vision/style and budget, and when I say budget, anytime you look at the pics from my couples weddings, whatever you think they may have spent, in reality they probably spent less because I know the right people out there. Our awesome vendor team on this wedding was: Frank Salas for the pics above and some were mine, Design Visage for the beautifying of all the ladies, Elegant by Design/florals, Chiavari chair rentals, TMMPRO, The Sugar Philosophers, Peter/Vive Ent, Naples Strings, White Flite Dove Release, and my fave Rabbi, Rabbi Ian!! And of course the wonderful ladies and gentlemen at the Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel xooxoxo

This is just a wee blog to say, if you are worried about rain and sometimes it should just be about it may be really cold/uncomfortable for your guests, then plan on an indoor wedding where you can control the environment and then you won’t be stressed if on the day you have to move in and the look is not what you had envisioned. If you start to feel a few days ahead its not going to be as planned then you can get a tent ordered to keep the same spot/view but of course that may be cost that you were not prepared or willing to pay for. But if you are planning on an outdoor ceremony and mother nature is not co-operating then be okay with the fact that there will be a location to move inside to at your venue, and things happen for a reason (sometimes it takes a long time to work out what, lol).

The picture above, this was an intimate wedding for 25, they had come from Russia and all over the USA, the pacific ocean and the venue was the reason they came. We moved the arch inside, we circled the chairs around, through the windows you could see the sky and we dimmed the chandelier which gave a lovely romantic feel. My crappy pic doesn’t do it justice but the guests were comfortable, the bride was not wet or shivering through her ceremony, and then got to go and have pics around the property.

I have moved weddings to overhangs with courtyards as backdrops, rooms with ocean views and we opened the doors as the backdrop, and four walled rooms that weren’t great but by bringing the lights down/adding candles were able to give a more romantic feel ceremony than would have happened outside. For a couple where we knew they were longer ceremonies and we were going to be outside for long length of time which even if it was not going to be raining would be very uncomfortable for the guests and they would probably get up and move inside anyway, we made the decision a few days ahead to move ceremony inside and paid to have draping done in the ballroom section we were able to use, the florist tweaked the vision to match being inside now/adjusted things, and they have turned out beautiful and not a whole lot of extra cost.

Sometimes the items the hotel provides work with a brides colors and feel, and this short blog is just to show how this one did. For this wedding at Ritz-Carlton Laguna, the brides colors were blue and the feeling was oceany. Could we have done rentals yes but the new carpet in her banquet room worked with the look/feel/colors and the hotels ivory linens/napkins, blue/green banquet chairs (which they preferred from a comfort level) and the RC charger with the blue worked perfectly, along with the blue water in all the vases and white florals done by Karen’s Flowers. We added blue lighting to frame it all, and it really turned out very pretty.

For nearly a year I had the pleasure of helping Danielle and her mom (her stepmom really but you would not know it, what a wonderful relationship they have and even dad made mention of it during his toast) and Dad pull together what I had no doubt was going to be a beautiful and fun celebration.

I had done wedding ceremonies at Island Hotel at their old ceremony area which is no longer there, but not done any at their only outdoor area for ceremonies the Cabana Patio, so this was my first and it turned out beautifully.

The cake picture does not do it any justice, but that cake was beautiful, the pastry chef at Island Hotel really puts his heart into every cake, love him.

From the beginning the colors were black and white and we went all the way, black linens/napkins (from Luxe Linens), chairs and dancefloor and with the off white draping we added around the room (by TMMPRO who also did the lighting, we stuck with amber to allow the candle light from the tables to stand out more) the florals were able to stand out. Beautiful job with the ceremony floral, draping and chandeliers by Flowers by Cina and in the ballroom too, lots of glass and candles, it was fabulous.

The pics above and below are a mix of mine and Jacqueline Kay Photography, love working with them. Thanks to Design Visage for keeping everyone on time, unlike a couple of weddings I did after this one who did not use them and put everything behind so brides ended up with very little of the photography they may have gone in hoping to get. We had Naples Strings for the ceremony and they moved to cocktails, so easy to work with, and to the team at Island with Deanna at the helm, we are lucky enough right now to be there once a month, and love being there, the banquet captains are fab and the hotel has such a great feel and because they don’t have a lot of ballroom space its like being at an exclusive/one wedding a day only venue/hotel, but not paying for it.

Wayne Foster Band did the mceeing and music, I LOED their grand piano that they brought in and put on the stage which is a feat in itself, not many bands do that, but let me add that it was covered in crystals, beautiful.

Then my new fave vendor from 2016, The Sugar Philosophers, Kim does a beautiful job, very elegant displays, our bride wanted this one colorful and it was. This table was the placecard table earlier, I love reusing that table.

This wedding was wonderful. An older couple who had found each other and wanted to celebrate with their family and friends, and this was one celebration where you could feel the love and genuine want for them to be happy/enjoy life together. It was a January wedding and the ceremony was planned for indoors from the beginning, so there was never a worry about the wedding or it being too dark/cold outside.

Thanks to Karla at Elegant by Design for really listening and making the bride so happy, she was not really wanting many florals, so the perfect mix was created giving a very elegant/romantic feel, along with the full room draping we did and the round glossy/seamless dancefloor which was more full than I normally see, now whether that is because this group loves to dance, or the fact that my fave band, Full Spectrum with Adam Jackson, was playing, hmmmm not sure but could have been both!! Thanks to the team at Island Hotel for being so wonderful to work with, this year we look like we are going to be there once a month. xoxoxox